Playing passive with Ao Kuang

I have to say that a good Ao SHOULD have some passive qualities to him, especially when he is by himself. However, if played with skill he can be EXTREMELY aggro and get away with it too.

I'll basically take everything I've seen you guys have said and give my take.

1. Land Ult on someone who's chasing/ganking: Yes and no. It can be done, and when it does happen you should feel accomplished. What you should do, if someone is chasing you or if you just got ganked is to drop Spirit's Tempest ON YOURSELF, then move in a circle formation so that the enemy will be stupid enough to walk right into it. After that, you might even be able to change things up and get a kill yourself.

2. Rushing in mid with Ao: I do it all the time, you just have to do it in the right way. Usually, I will drop a Tornadoes on the enemy, then Slither away toward a tower or ally. When I do it that way, I am usually giving the chance for an ally to get some damage in as well, so never be afraid to charge in as Ao, but you DO need to have a rather passive attitude. You cannot rush in, drop a Tornadoes, then keep throwing your basics. Consider the movement to be like guerrilla warefare.

3. A good time for an Ao to be aggro is when you have your team surrounding you, because Ao's skills all have some sort of AoE so you will DOMINATE IN A TEAM FIGHT! Late game is a perfect time for Ao because the enemy team likes to squeeze together in an attempt to fight your team, so why not drop an Ult on their face?

4. Work with a team mate and set up a plan to focus someone down, which is an excellent thing to do with Ao. For instance, I always play with a jungling Fenrir, who will jump out of the jungle, use Ragnarok and grab someone, and then I will drop my Ult, on their face, in Fenrir's mouth. It is possibly one of the most cruel things I have ever seen.

5. In the presence of an enemy getting to close, never be afraid to drop a Tornadoes on yourself. It will generally keep them away. Then Slither away.

Generally speaking, Ao should be the kind of God to drop Tornadoes, and then hang out in the back toward his tower. That is perfectly fine. However, if an enemy is at low health, bursting them down with a Squall is never a bad option. If an Ao is fed, the enemy will fear him, and while that doesn't mean that you should get cocky is DOES mean that you are more free to explore the lane, since they won't be attacking you as much. If they do... well, I think you can figure that out.

I actually played against a very aggressive ao recently. One of the best ao's I've ever seen. Very good at making sure every tornado went on my head. Very good at landing his squall.

I play a brusier Ra when I go mid. I get a breastplate of valor and a voidstone. Needless to say he was kicking my butt early game. Every time I turned my back on him he was chasing me. Didn't matter how much HP he had. If he had 2 hp and I turned my back, he'd be on me. He landed his abilities most of the time. I play a very pushy ballsy Ra. And he was punishing me for getting that close to him without boots.


Once I got boots, I ate him up. But he was nasty.

A good ao is not passive. A good ao is aggressive. He owns the lane. No one gets near him. You'll note he's squishy but that is only compared to enemy gods with full HP. A good ao will make enemy gods low and keep them low. Then he'll dash in for a quick squall to kill them.

In all honesty, he probably killed me more times then I killed him. But... I kept all my towers and he lost all three of his... so... I feel I won that.

... such Ao will die every time he chases U when UR team have Loki, Fenrir or Thor. OFC Ao can be agressive when it comes to 1vs1 on mid, because the other god on mid is also squishy mage who is not designed to kill gods but to push lane. But if Ao stands 1vs1 with bruiser or assasin with stun, he has no chances (well ofc sometimes U face very poor assasins and then Ao wins :P). I'm not afraid of enemy mid god. I'm afraid that when I'll chase him, he'll ask for a gank. Ofc sometimes enemy team is not helping ech other and U can afford to be agressive but... Ao is a free kill for many physical gods ;)

First off, why are you saying "U" instead of "you" and "UR" instead of "you're"/"you are". Its annoying.

To the point, Ao can and should be played aggressively. The good Ao players are very aggressive. He absolutely has finishing power. Squall is Ao's primary finishing power. Ao dances around dropping tornadoes until people get low. Then he dashes in for a kill with squall. The ult is not required. Though honestly, if you think Ao's ult is bad you should try Ra's. It does less damage, has less AoE, and Ra "stops" to use it which means ra can't use it to escape. About the only thing its good for is clearing creep waves, getting lucky with snipes, or timing it to avoid hard CC.

You should think of Ao's ult in these two ways:

1. Use it as an "oh really" power... something you drop when people get in your face or act really aggressively. You just dragon them and then see if they want to still play with you.

2. You use it as a "Hi, I'm Ao" power. This thing is a game changer in team fights. You hang back dropping tornadoes and trying to not get focused. When the enemy starts focusing someone else... you dragon them. Everyone dies.

Shinji, you MUST play lower level games, because any Ao Kuang that is "... a free kill for many physical gods ;)" is not a good Ao Kuang.

It is certainly not true that Loki, Fenrir, or Thor can decimate an Ao Kuang because while they can, a good Ao will be able to react to any attack from a brusier/assassin. Squall with Gem if Isolation gives a 75% slow, which can surely change things around. Dropping a Tornadoes can easily take half of Loki's health, and...

An aggressive Ao Kuang can learn to drop his Ultimate in his vicinity, then move so that the enemy will run right into it. I have done it many times, and it usually gets the enemy killed before me.

And by the way, "...because the other god on mid is also squishy mage who is not designed to kill gods but to push lane". Not designed to kill Gods? That is extremely ignorant. First of all, there are MANY viable physical mids, such as Hercules, Neith, Apollo, Anhur, LOKI, Vamana, and Xbalanque. Second, getting kills in mid is more important than you think. A good mid will gank the side lanes if their lane is pushed well and help the other lanes, but they will also strive to poke and kill their in-lane enemy. If you think that only mages are in mid and they aren't supposed to kill, then I assume you switched from League of Legends.

Wait until you get into lvl 30 games, and then you will see what we are talking about.

Well, yesterday I faced extremely good Chronos and I think I understand what You're talking about ^^. Well I'm talking from the point of view of 23 level player who only plays casual conquests. I simply find it hard to be agressive without any communication from other teammates (it happens very often).

OK so my Ao should get agressive and so on but what should I do when enemy has a good jungler? Simply buy some wards? If enemy team has good Loki he often catches me off guard.

I didn't switched from LoL, actually Smite is my very first MOBA game. I really appreciate Your help because I simply lack understanding of the game. And thanks for changing my view on how Ao should be played.

"U" "UR" - I do it to type faster but if it's relly that annoying then I'll stop that :D

game isn't really balanced... playing ao against loki etc is not really fair for a lot of reasons.

people will say he can do something but the reality is that you need armor to not get one shotted by him. And even then its dicey.


Consider getting breastplate of valor on Ao. He gets some MP from the mana so it isn't a total loss and it will give you CDR so that's good as well. Sad to say, the game's balance is poor and getting worse. Just a reality.


Increasingly the objective seems to be making terrible 10 year olds feel the thrill of accomplishment at a cheap kill. All the clever strategies that shut the twitch players down have been nerfed into oblivion meaning that it all comes down to reaction time. And reaction time favors the aggressor and whomever has better ping.

If your ping is slightly higher and you're on the defensive... you're meat. Wasn't always that way. You could outsmart twits in smite. But now its all monkey reaction time. So... be faster.